


baby, we're the new romantics

by ohmcgee



Category: Batman (Comics)
Genre: M/M, the one where they work in a sex shop au, there is a sad lack of porn in this considering they sell sex toys, whoops
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-17
Updated: 2015-03-17
Packaged: 2018-03-18 06:37:50
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3559844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohmcgee/pseuds/ohmcgee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jason and Steph work for Bruce selling sex toys and paraphernalia. Tim's a customer. This is that AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	baby, we're the new romantics

**Author's Note:**

> IDEK.

"I can't get over how gorgeous these things are," Steph is saying as they set up the display of glass toys. "I mean, seriously. I think I'm going to buy one of each and set them up on my mantle at home."

"I'm sure your mother would love that," Bruce says dryly as he walks behind her. "Jason, straighten up row four when you're done, it looks like a four year old's been rearranging things."

"Row four is flavored lube," Jason says, balancing another box on the display. "Try another metaphor."

"Hn," Bruce says. 

"I'm just saying, Jason, look how _pretty_ they are." Jason looks at the glass dildo in Steph’s hands. It really is a work of art, swirls of colors beneath the clear glass, beautiful, hand-blown curves. He bets if she set one out on the mantle no one would even know what it was. Until she told them, because she’s Steph, of course she’d tell the. "Whoa, speaking of pretty." 

Jason follows her gaze over to the door. A guy, a little on the youngish side for Jason’s tastes, walks in, staring up at the little bells like he wants to rip them off. He’s wearing a shirt with Leia on it in rebel gear instead of that horrible slave outfit and Jason thinks he’d like him even if he didn’t have a mouth made for porn. 

"Dibs," They say at the same time and Bruce grumbles under his breath and skulks back into the back to get away from them. Jason glances over and catches the guy’s eye for a moment, but then Steph’s stepping in front and intercepting because she is the literal worst friend/roommate/co-worker ever.

"Hey. Hi. Anything I can help you find?"

"Just looking around," the guy says, offering her a friendly smile, then sneaks another look at Jason before looking back at the shelf in front of him. 

"Kay, I'm Steph. Just let me know if I can help you with anything."

Jason keeps an eye on him while he browses. He doesn't seem to be looking for anything in particular, but he's checking out almost everything. When he runs his fingers over the swing they have on display Jason thinks he actually blushes. He doesn’t remember the last time he blushed. He's been working for Bruce for five years. He helped a middle aged woman pick out nipple clamps last week. Nothing makes him blush anymore. When the guy moves on to the anal toys, Jason busies himself with his work so he doesn’t look like a creep.

 

***

 

"Check me out?"

Jason almost drops the box in his hand. Bruce would have fucking _murdered_ him if he'd dropped an eighty dollar glass toy. "Huh?" 

The guy gives him an apologetic smile. "You work here too, right?" 

“Yeah,” Jason says, setting the last box on top of the display. “You need, uh, help finding anything?” The guy totally blushes and it makes him look even younger and Jason wonders how old this kid even _is._ He probably shouldn’t ask. But he wants to.

"No, I just. I’m ready to check out. And I couldn’t find the girl."

"No problem,” Jason says, picking up the empty case the toys had came in, toting it over behind the desk. He takes the eighteen ounce bottle of Astroglide from the guy and rings it up. "Um. Anything else?" 

"Um. Condoms?" He blushes again and Jason usually _hates_ that, the awkward, prude-ish type that come in and giggle behind the shelves, or end up looking horrified and leaving without buying a damn thing. He doesn’t have the time or the patience to hold someone’s hand and tell them their kinks are safe here, or whatever bullshit Steph spews to sell all the shit she sells each month. This is different though. He kind of _wants_ to see this kid squirm some more.

“Gonna have to be a bit more specific than that, darlin,” Jason says and gestures to the glass case underneath them. The way the kid stares down into it reminds Jason of a book he read once about soldiers coming home from war, standing for hours in front of the cereal in the grocery store because they were too freaked out about all the choices. Jason decides to give the poor kid a break and help him out a little.

"These Thyn ones? Real nice, barely feels like anythings there. And these," he points to the very back, at a pink package. “Taste just like strawberry ice cream, I shit you not."

The guy gawks at him. He almost looks like he wants to ask how Jason knows that, but he doesn’t, just silently points at the Thyn ones Jason pointed to first and Jason opens up the case and rings them up. 

“So,” Jason says when he hands him the paper bag. “We’re having a sale on Saturday.” He’s kind of shit at this part too. He hardly ever remembers to promote sales or up-sell anything. Honestly he doesn’t even know why Bruce hasn’t fired him yet. Probably because they used to fuck and he’d have epic guilt about it or something. Guy’s weird like that. “Fifty-percent off all things bondage.” He grins. 

“Thanks,” The guy -- Tim, he’d signed on the receipt -- laughs nervously and takes the bag. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

Jason feels the weirdest twinge in his chest when the bells jingle as he walks out, like he kind of hopes he does.

“Wow that was fucking adorable,” Steph says, emerging from wherever the hell she’d disappeared to.

“Shut up,” Jason says, throwing a package of edible underwear at her. “Where did you go?” 

Steph shrugs. “Made myself scarce so you could, you know,” she waves her hand around and hits Jason in the chest with the package. “Do your thing. Since he obviously wasn’t into me. Tragedy, that. The things I could use that mouth for.”

They’re both kind of quiet for a few minutes, lost in their own thoughts about Tim and his incredibly pornographic mouth, until Bruce clears his throat behind them.

“A case of lubricant is leaking out all over the floor of my office. It smells like _pineapple_ ,” He grimaces. “Whoever cleans it up can leave early.”

Steph manages to get to it first, but only because she’s a terrible person and trips him, sending him flying into a rack of leather corsets. 

 

***

Saturday is retail _hell._ There’s people everywhere, touching everything, asking him five hundred questions. Barely five minutes go by before the fucking bells are jingling again. He doesn’t even get to take a lunch. The only redeeming part of it, Jason guesses, is that it’s a specific, kink-centered sale, so most of the people who come in know what they want and are matter-of-fact about it, no secondhand embarrassment to deal with. 

He’s on the aisle helping a big, burly dude pick out a set of cuffs that’ll fit around his enormous wrists when he hears Steph’s voice. 

“Well, this stuff’s pretty awesome,” She says. Jason hands the dude a set of leather cuffs and let’s him try them out, still listening. “It’s like, mint chocolate flavored? But it’s got that really sweet aftertaste like diet coke has, you know, so if that kind of thing gives you a headache like me, then go with this one. It’s un-flavoured but it still does an awesome job at numbing the back of --”

“Yeah, these are good,” the guy says to Jason. “I’ll take them.”

Jason makes out a flash of dark hair next to Steph as he walks with the guy to the register and rings up him. Then a woman walks in with her girlfriend, asking him to show them where the harnesses are and once he gets back and finishes ringing them up, Tim’s gone and Steph’s flopped down on the floor, shoving Cheetos in her face. 

“Was that…” Jason gestures at the door. “He came back?”

Steph looks up at him, licking Cheeto dust off her fingers, and smirks. “Yep,” She pops her p’s. “Apparently he’s got a pretty bad gag reflex.”

“Jesus Christ,” Jason mutters. “I’m taking a _break._ ”

Steph’s laughter follows him all the way to the breakroom.

 

***

 

It’s a couple of weeks before Tim comes back in the store. Jason had resigned himself to the fact that Steph probably embarrassed the shit out of him the last time he was there and that he’d probably never set foot in another sex shop again, let alone theirs. So when the bells jingle and Jason looks up from the magazine he was reading to see him standing there, he’s a little shocked. Tim’s hair is wet and his t-shirt is sticking to him obscenely and it takes Jason a second to realize it’s because it’s raining outside. 

“Hey,” He says, awkwardly. It’s so dumb. They have plenty of regulars that come in. Jordan and Emily, the lesbians who are way into bdsm, even invited him to a grill-out once. Mal and Pete, a middle aged couple who have been married nineteen years, come in all the time and show Jason and Steph pictures of their new grandbabies. One time Mal tried to set him up with her niece and Steph tactlessly broke it to her that Jason “wasn’t a huge fan of the vagina.” Mal had just laughed and said one of her sons was gay, but he was married so she figured his husband wouldn’t appreciate her setting him up with Jason. So yeah, he doesn’t get weird around regulars. Just this one, apparently. 

“Tim!” Steph steps in and saves him from his stupidity. “You’re back, awesome. Come here, let me show you this new stuff we got in.” And she drags him by the elbow down one of the aisles. Tim just looks back over his shoulder at Jason with a hilariously helpless look on his face and Jason just shrugs. _What can you do?_  
  
It’s a slow day, no one else in the store, and Jason can hear her voice carry over the aisles, but not quite loud enough to hear what she’s talking about. Finally, they walk back up to the registers and Steph’s about to ring him up when someone comes in asking for her.

“Sorry,” She says to Tim. “Jay, you mind ringing him up? Lena called earlier and I’ve gotta get her thing from the back.”

“Yeah sure, no problem,” Jason says, quickly logging on to the register. He looks at the dvd Tim slides across the counter, _Gay of Thrones_ , and tries not to laugh. It’d be unprofessional or something. It doesn’t keep him from opening his stupid mouth though. “Huh. I’d pegged you for a _Twinky and the Bear,_ ” He smirks when Tim’s eyes start to go all wide and embarrassed. “Or maybe a _Daddy Chasers_.”

But then Tim’s glancing to the left at Bruce, who’s bending over to put some things on a bottom shelf and then back at Jason, quirks his mouth into the sexiest little smirk Jason’s ever seen and says, “Sure that’s me you’re thinking of?”

Jason laughs to cover up the fact that he kind of chokes a little, the back of his neck prickling with warmth and says, “A gag reflex _and_ a sense of humor,” just to get back at him a little and okay, maybe to watch him go that pretty shade of red _everywhere._ “Twenty oh-seven, kid.”

Tim pulls out his debit card and hands it to him. “I’m nineteen,” he says conversationally. 

Jason looks up at him, snorts. “You look about twelve.”

Tim grins. “Some guys like that.”

 _I usually don’t_ , Jason thinks as he watches him leave, but apparently his dick has recently changed it’s preferences.

 

***

 

On October third, Tim walks in the door, goes to the back right corner where they keep the dildos, then walks back up to the front and sets the package down in front of Jason. It’s...pretty big. Definitely not for beginners, Jason thinks, but when he opens his mouth to give him some unsolicited advice, like maybe he should start small, or like, buy a gallon of lube at least, Tim cuts him off.

“That’s all.”

Jason rings him up then stomps past Steph on aisle three, growling, “I’m going to have a cigarette. Or thirty.”

 

***

 

Thursday nights are pizza and movie night, but Steph won’t shut up long enough for Jason to hear what Ben Afleck’s going on about this time. He catches her ankle when she pokes his thigh with her foot.

“ _What?_ ”

“When are you gonna ask him out?”

“Who?” Jason asks, reaching into the popcorn bowl. Steph polished off the last pizza about an hour ago. 

“ _Who_ ,” Steph mocks. “Don’t be an asshole. Twinky little nerd that comes in all the time to flirt with you? Ringing any bells?” 

Jason throws popcorn in her hair. “He’s not flirting with me, he’s just buying shit. There’s a difference.”

Steph rolls her eyes. “He’s been making heart eyes at you ever since the first day he came in, dude. He _wants_ you.”

Jason scratches his stubble. “I don’t know. Don’t you think that’s kind of unethical? I help him pick out sex toys and shit. Just seems wrong somehow, like a shrink dating their patient.”

Steph laughs so loud the neighbors complain. “Please,” She says. “You _have_ no ethics, Jason Todd. Wait -- oh my god. You’re nervous!”

“I’m not --”

“Oh god, this is adorable. You’re _adorable._ You’re afraid to ask him out. I’ve never seen you afraid to ask _anyone_ out. This is like, wow. This is big.”

Jason wonders if it’s possible for him to drown in his beer. “I’m not afraid of shit,” he says. “Just. You know. Maybe he has a boyfriend.”

Steph raises an eyebrow. “That’s never stopped you before.”

Fuck. She’s right.

“Yeah, okay. Fine. I”ll ask him out. Next time he comes in, his ass is getting asked out.”

“You better,” Steph says, grabbing the remote to turn the volume back up. “I think I saw Bruce checking him out last time.”

Jason clenches his jaw. “Oh _hell_ no.”

 

***

 

Tim comes in the next weekend, almost like clockwork. He buys a box of condoms, a new porn they got in on Tuesday, and talks to Steph for a few minutes as she puts new price tags on some of the clearance merch. He hardly even blushes when he puts his stuff on the counter for Jason to ring up. It’s a damn shame. 

“So -” Jason says at the same time Tim says, “Hey--”

Tim laughs and rubs the back of his neck. “You go first.”

“No, you,” Jason says and looks up at Tim after swiping his card. 

“Okay. Uh. I’ve got two tickets --”

“To Iron Maiden, baby?”

Tim’s eyebrows scrunch together and Jason waves his hand. “Nevermind.” 

“Anyway, I won these tickets from the radio. They’re for a hockey game. I don’t really watch hockey or like, know anything about it really, but I figured since I had the tickets I should at least go and --”

“Beer and hot dudes beating the shit out of each other on razor sharp blades?” Jason grins as he puts Tim’s stuff in the bag. “I’m in.”

Tim stares at him in shock for a moment, like he never actually thought Jason would say yes and Jason kind of wants to slap him upside the back of his cute little head. “Cool,” he says, taking the bag from Jason. “It’s Friday at six thirty.”

Jason nods. “We close up at six. You want to just meet me here?”

“Sure,” Tim says and he hasn’t stopped smiling since Jason said yes. “I”ll see you then.”

When Jason finally stops staring at the door, he turns around to see Steph grinning at him, twirling a pink silicone cock ring around her finger. “ _Adorable_ ,” she says and Jason flips her off, stalking off to dust the shelves to hide the stupid grin on his face. 

 

***

 

“This is pretty brutal,” Tim says just about the time another player is slammed up against the glass in front of them, leaving behind a smear of blood.

“I know,” Jason says, leaning forward to check out if the guy lost any teeth. “It’s fucking awesome!”

It’s the first game either of them have ever been to, or watched for that matter, but Tim seems to pick it up pretty quick, explaining things to Jason like why the whistle was blown this time or what a powerplay is, and Jason buys them nachos and beer for himself when it’s intermission. 

“This is pretty cool,” he says. “I don’t go on a lot of, uh, dates.”

Tim raises an eyebrow at him as he licks nacho cheese off his thumb. 

“Not like _that_ ,” Jason says. “Well, maybe a little like that.” He flashes his teeth. “But I just mean. I haven’t done this in a while, I guess.”

“I haven’t done this ever,” Tim admits and Jason’s impressed that he doesn’t look the least bit embarrassed by it. “With a guy, I mean.”

“Well,” Jason says, rubbing at the condensation on his cup with his thumb. “How you liking it so far?”

Tim licks his lips. Jason’s not sure if it’s involuntary or he’s _trying_ to drive him crazy. “Honestly? I’m kind of ready to leave.”

“Oh.” Jason feels his face fall. He’s suddenly really pissed at Steph. This kid’s not even -- he was just his fucking experiment or something and now --

“With you, dumbass.”

Jason laughs, hoping to cover up vulnerability he just let slip right out there in the open. Fuck, he doesn’t usually do that. What is his deal? “Oh. You don’t want to see who wins?”

Tim blinks at him through his long, dark eyelashes. “Kinda want to see you more.”

And yep, okay. Jason doesn’t have to be told twice. Or okay, maybe he does, but he doesn’t have to be told _again._ He gets up and grabs Tim’s hand and nearly spills his beer all over a little old lady in a Flyer’s jersey as they make their exit.

 

***

They’ve been making out on Tim’s couch for hours, maybe. Maybe it’s only been minutes. Time kind of slipped away once Tim pulled him on top of him and started making all those breathy little noises every time Jason put his mouth on him. Jason likes the spot right under his ear the best, the way it makes him whimper and dig his fingers into his shoulders. 

Tim had said this was his first time with a guy, but Jason wonders if he just meant his first _date_ because jesus christ, the way he’s grinding up against his hip and pulling Jason’s lip between his teeth, he surely doesn’t seem inexperienced is all he’s saying.

“God, you’re hot,” Jason mumbles into his skin, dragging his tongue across Tim’s collarbone. “Sure you haven’t done this before?”

Tim arches into Jason when his teeth graze his skin. “I’ve done...things.” 

“Yeah?” Jason asks, pulling back to look at him. Tim’s a wreck, lips red and puffy from being kissed and bitten, red splotches on the side of his neck where Jason got too carried away, his eyes dark and hooded. “What kind of things you wanna do now?”

“I really,” Tim says, “ _really_ want to blow you.”

“Christ,” Jason mutters and presses his head against Tim’s shoulder for a moment before sitting back. “You sure? I mean. Steph said you --”

Tim puts his fingers to Jason’s mouth and scoots off the couch to kneel between his legs. “I’ve been practicing,” he says, working Jason’s jeans open. 

“Practicing?” Jason asks and lifts his hips so Tim can pull his jeans down.

“Mmhm,” Tim hums. Jason bites the inside of his cheek when Tim takes him out of his briefs, fingers curling tight around him. “Remember the thing I bought?”

He doesn’t even have to be specific for Jason to know he’s talking about the fucking huge purple dildo Tim bought a few weeks ago. He hasn’t been able to _stop_ thinking about it, of course he remembers it. 

“Yeah, I,” and there’s the blush Jason has been missing. “I practiced on that and got...better.”

Then Tim’s mouth is on him, sure and wet and hot, and he moans around Jason like he can’t believe it’s this good and it’s all Jason can do not to palm the back of his head and shove his cock straight down his throat. He just keeps picturing him, going down on the dildo _Jason_ sold him, wonders if Tim was thinking about him when he was doing it, wonders how many times he had to _practice_ before he stopped gagging around it. Jason gets so caught up in his thoughts and the feeling of Tim’s hot, perfect mouth around him that he totally forgets to warn him before he comes, not that he thinks he could have helped it anyway. 

Tim just sits back and drags his hand over his mouth like a champ, giving Jason’s this lopsided smile, and later, when people will ask Jason when he just _knew_ that he was in love with Tim, that’s the moment he’ll think of. He won’t say it, because Tim will look all horrified and hit him with something and refuse to let Jason touch him for a week, but they’ll both know. 

That was the moment he was well and truly _fucked._


End file.
